Posts Tagged ‘Ron “The Con” Gould’

Original Title, before I realized I broke my “first strip of the chapter is the title of the chapter” thing: Speechus Inspiratus Interruptus.

BREAKING NEWS: Tonight (Saturday, November 19th, 2011) I will be appearing LIVE at Real Canadian Wrestling: Road to Redemption! Come say hi and pick up an autographed copy of HEAT Volume 1, then settle in for the amazing action of the Gladiator Cup tournament featuring 8 of RCW’s top stars, as well as a pair of tag team grudge matches!

With that out of the way, on to today’s comic, which features the rare combination of a fake-Latin title and a throwaway character I drew based on a girl I went on one date with because I thought her hair would be interesting to draw.

Speaking of throwaway characters, that’s what Invincinator was supposed to be when he first appeared as the result of the contest I ran in the early days of the comic, but I had so much fun writing his goofy super heavyweight-in-his-own-mind gimmick that I kept coming up with more things to do with him. He does tend to be a pain in the ass to draw in matches, though, since I have to constantly adjust things due to his height (or lack thereof).

The end of chapter 9! HEAT Volume 1 had 7 chapters and clocked in at 100 pages, including Classic Wrestling Moments. Volume 2 is composed of only 3 chapters and will be somewhere in the 120 range, I think. For my own sanity I will hopefully be smart enough to divide up volume 3 a bit better. But up next, chapter 10, the final chapter of volume 2! The last panel of this comic tells you pretty much all you need to know about what that chapter is going to be about.

I think this might be the first time the Super Max Challenge Cup has been shown in the comic, so I guess I’ll talk a bit about it. The idea of having a bit event which awarded a trophy was stolen from Japan by TNA to create the various X Cup tournaments that they used to run when they were watchable, which are the events which inspired the Super Max Challenge. I remember watching the X Cup for the first time on one of TNA’s Wednesday night PPVs from the Asylum, which I would have friends over to watch once in a while. I think it was the second one, which featured Team Mexico against Team UK, and a really fascinating clash of styles, as the Mexican team wanted to fly all over the place and the British team was all about ring psychology and chaining holds together with only a few big moves to punctuate matches. It was a very different affair than the later X Cups in which all of the teams seem to have agreed that flying around and hitting big moves every ten seconds would be the mutual strategem, and my first exposure to the British style of wrestling (other than commentators mentioning it every time somebody threw a European uppercut). I really liked the tournament format that they had set up, particularly because it was the kind of simple, tight storytelling that I love in wrestling.

Also, while I was writing this I got a retweet from former ECW World Heavyweight Champion Steve Corino. Fucking sweet. It was about people putting Paterno’s contributions to Penn State football over the fact that he was aware his assistant was raping kids and let it happen. Significantly less sweet.

AND FINALLY: I’m taking a week off from posting comics because my school semester has seriously burnt me out and I need a week to recharge. I’ll be back with Classic Wrestling Moments #10 next Wednesday!

There was a lot of thinking involved in figuring out how to approach the tag team titles in this match, with a few different directions being considered. One discarded scenario was that Doc would somehow convince/provoke LGN or their warden into putting up the tag team titles in this match, but the payoff of that situation didn’t really work in the long term projection of where the comic is going. After talking it over and bouncing ideas off of Dan Schneider (artist for the back-up story in HEAT Volume 1, available now) we came up with what you just read, which plants some seeds for later on while providing a reminder that the tag team titles A) exist and B) are desireable. So the opposite of how WWE treats their tag team titles, basically. You’ll have to keep reading to find out what exactly this altercation might lead to, though.

And that’s the final match of round 2 of the Super Max Challenge! I am also now fully aware that this story arc is going to last longer than a year, because I’m still writing the eight man tag team match that will cap it off, and there’s a decent chunk of that match left. It’s easily going to be the longest match of the comic so far. Which I suppose is natural since it’s a Survivor Series-style elimination match with eight characters in it.

On Wednesday: Doc is a really sore winner. A really, really sore winner.

Hart Attack jokes are kind of like the title jokes I write for Johnny Law matches: awful puns that I don’t feel even the slightest bit badly about thoroughly abusing. I think this might be my favourite page in this match, mostly because of how much fun it was to do all of the motion stuff while Dick is bouncing back and forth on the ropes. The motion of him slamming his helmet into Dos was more of a challenge than a joy, as I ended up drawing and erasing various attempts at it for a few hours before finally ending up with one I liked (that process included erasing what I had thought the night before would be the completed panel because I realized the next day that I hated it).

While you can clearly see that I eventually settled on having Dick and Ron use a modified Hart Attack as a tag team signature, you didn’t see the whole whack of other moves I considered first. If it was a tag team move from the late ’80s/early ’90s and I could figure out how to work a headbutt into it, I worked out a spot involving it. I came really close to using the PowerPlex (anybody else remember Power & Glory?) with a diving headbutt replacing Paul Roma’s big splash, but I couldn’t come up with a sequence I liked for it.

On Wednesday: Three count or kick in the back of the head? Both are fine choices, whatever floats your boat, really.

I wrote more HEAT scripts today for the first time in, like, a month. I’m in the mid 180s now, script-wise, and not quite as far ahead as I would like to be art-wise. And to think, I had a thirteen strip buffer not so long ago. I get two weeks off from school before I start my practicum, so hopefully I’ll be able to build the buffer back up a little bit during that time.

If you don’t get Doc’s line about the backdrop, take a look back at HEAT #92. Or just crack open your copy of HEAT Volume 1, because you’ve surely gotten your hands on a copy by now. Haven’t you? Well it’s a good thing you can order it right here.

On Saturday: If you don’t watch your cholesterol you’ll have a Hart Attack.

I love awful sequel subtitles. A lot. Any title ending in “the re(blank)ening” WILL get a laugh out of me, pretty much guaranteed.

Oh, and I also forgot about the update yesterday because I spent pretty much all day at work and then writing an essay for school. It was really nice of my professors to make all of the semester’s major assignments due in a three day span next week. It was also nice of the University to decide that a semester condensing four months worth of work into two months.

Special man-pain was such a goofy joke the last time these two teams clashed that I decided to bring it back, especially once I wrote the spot where Dos got crotched on the turnbuckle.

On Wednesday: Hot tag! He’s cleaning house! That doesn’t make sense, as cleaning a house typically isn’t an activity that involves violence!

I couldn’t update on Saturday because I was at work and then at Real Canadian Wrestling’s Rise of Legends show, but I got a sweet piece of bonus content for you today to make up for that! Scroll down to check out the Supreme-Adonnas (Heavy Metal and Tommy Lee Curtis) taking on WWF legends Demolition IN FULL.

Oh wrestling referees, you’re the only sports officials for whom being blind and easily knocked out is a job requirement.

I’ve finally written my review of the RCW show I went to… a month ago? Shit, that was not a good turnaround time at all. Anyway, that’ll be going up tomorrow, which is good since I’m going to have to push back Saturday’s update, because my school schedule is kicking my ass. My comic output has dropped off pretty significantly (about half of what I was doing per week previously), which I can hopefully adjust to fairly soon.

Soon: RCW Collision Course show review, featuring photos and video!

On Wednesday: Is having a plumbing tool lodged in his brain enough to keep Ron down for the three count? Can Dick make the save in time? Does anyone actually answer these questions?

No, seriously, it’s like 50/50 whether or not Doc Crockett is about to murder Tim Van Patten on live pay-per-view. Except that I know what happens because I wrote it, and these pages were drawn over a month ago. Which is good since nowadays my time to draw HEAT pages is sadly limited by having actual real-life crap to do. Incidentally, next Saturday’s post will probably be done either from work or from my phone during the Real Canadian Wrestling show, which features Demolition. Yes, Ax and Smash. No, I don’t care that they’re probably in their 60s and can barely move, it’s going to be fucking awesome.

On Wednesday: We return to our regularly scheduled match while Doc Crockett stomps the piss and other fluids out of Tim Van Patten on the floor. They’re probably going to want to burn those mats later.